In Response to a Critic
by Lavender Kiss
Summary: A semi-essay in defense of Frozen after listening to a rather harsh critique against the movie. Keep in mind that this is also my opinion although I did try to justify my thoughts and ideas by using facts and examples. WARNING! SPOILERS! SPOILERS EVERYWHERE.


In Response to a Critic

I was initially just going to write a quick response but I got carried away and ended up writing a semi-essay. Sorry. I just disagreed so strongly I felt I had to justify myself thoroughly instead of just saying, you're wrong, I'm right. This movie was great.

I apologize in advance if I got any facts wrong but I've only seen this movie once so far.

WARNING! MAJOR MOVIE SPOILERS! IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE MOVIE, DON'T READ. If you don't care about spoilers, then by all means, dive right in.

**Psychoanalysis of the main characters **

Let's start with Anna and the claim that she is stupid. She's not. She's impulsive, she wants to be loved, she wants to explore since she's been stuck inside the castle all her life, and she's young. At most, she's reckless and this leads her to making 'what you would call' stupid choices. The question here though is why and the answer is because of how she grew up. In isolation. She's emotionally damaged. She wants a connection with someone because she feels like she's all alone and that she doesn't have anyone (her parents are dead and her sister avoids her, she doesn't have contact with the outside world apart from the servants but no one really of her own age and she admits to making conversation with paintings). To me, this speaks of a very lonely childhood with the bare minimum of human socialization and she probably grew up harboring feelings of being unloved by her sister. This would have gotten worse after the death of her parents because now all she had left was a sister that avoided her. Something she couldn't understand. She doesn't have any experience with people and especially no experience with bad people. She can't judge character because she's never had to and just sees things at face value. She's a vulnerable character, emotionally, and Hans takes advantage of that. But there are consequences to her inexperience and nativity. Because of her rashness, she and Elsa are almost killed. But she learns her lesson. Character growth. Personality wise, she is very similar to Rapunzel but this similarity is a consequence of the similar circumstances revolving around their childhood and the way they grew up. Although to be fair, Rapunzel is not an impulsive person. She planned how she was going to go about leaving her tower and seeing the floating lights, she battled with her conscious after but still decided to carry on, and she new exactly what she would be getting herself into when she decided to promise Mother Gothel she would never leave if she just let her heal Eugene. Anna didn't plan anything. She said yes to getting married to a guy she barely new because she saw the chance of leaving behind a life she wasn't happy living, she went after her sister in only her sleeveless dress despite the fact that it was snowing to bring her back home, she plans on reversing the eternal winter by just talking to her sister, etc. If anything, Anna is a more emotionally driven person than Rapunzel. Rapunzel is driven by a yearning to experience something more than just her tower.

Now as for Elsa, she was also isolated but while Anna grew up thinking she wasn't loved by her sister, Elsa grew up afraid of herself. Unlike Anna, Elsa was resigned to her loneliness because if she was alone, there wouldn't be a chance for her to hurt someone. The fact that she was even afraid to touch anyone (her parents for example) implies that she grew up with as little physical contact as possible. And yet the thought that she has the potential to kill someone, even by accident, causes her to mature much faster than any child should: she understands why Anna's memories were taken away, she understands why she has to stay away from her sister. She's willing to sacrifice her own happiness at such a young age to make sure the people she cares about are safe (on a side note, she's also willing to look like the bad guy if it protects her sister, as shown by when she refuses to allow Anna to marry Hans). Since her powers are emotionally driven, this adds another burden for her. She knows what she's capable of and the incident with her sister, only cemented a long lasting feeling of shame, guilt, and fear, not only for others but also a fear of what she could do. This of course, would affect her powers in a negative way. So how does she gain control over her powers? Let's start with examples. The three times in the film where she showed a mastery over her powers were: 1) when she was a child and playing with her sister 2) when she felt liberated from the lie she had been living her entire life and 3) when she lets herself fully feel the love she has for her sister (instead of being weighed down by shame, guilt, and fear). This proves that her being able to control her powers didn't come out of nowhere. Conclusion, she could always control her powers, but feelings of shame, guilt and fear kept getting in the way and the more these negative emotions took a hold of her the more chaotic her ice powers became. So the lessons that Elsa learns are not only to accept herself but to also let go of the negative emotions from the past and to look towards the future. She learns that she doesn't need to be alone. Character growth.

Kristoff is an interesting character in that he's not a stereotypical prince charming, or a handsome man, or a bad boy. He's average looking, socially awkward (he grew up with trolls and with a reindeer as a best friend), he doesn't really want to help Anna out initially, and he works for a living. Now this last part sets him apart because he's not a prince and add to that his poor economic situation, well…he's definitely no John Smith or Shang, both of whom are, in many ways, more privileged. He falls under with Aladdin and Flynn Rider except those two steal for a living while Kristoff works for every penny he gets. This is shown by the scene were even at a young age he was mingling with adults doing adult things to survive. The fact that he isn't perfect makes him more relatable (and adorkable). I don't know about most people, but I definitely give my pets voices. It doesn't make me insane; it makes me a person who really loves her pets. I would also say that like Elsa and Anna, Kristoff also suffered from loneliness (and possibly prejudice since he's not only an orphan but he's also an oddity) and learned to cope in his own way by not allowing 'people' to get close. All in all, Kristoff reminds me of a friendly giant; he looks unapproachable and grouchy but once you get to know him, you discover he's actually a giant socially awkward sweetheart. I admit though, that of the three, he's the one that lacks any character growth, although you could argue that his character growth was about learning to care about someone that wasn't him, Sven, or the trolls.

**Now for a quick look at the minor characters and villains**

Disney always has to have sidekicks. In _Frozen_, they are named Sven and Olaf and they both serve a purpose. Sven is Kristoff's reindeer, his best friend, and his mode of transportation. Forget about character development here, he literally drives the plot by getting characters from point A to point B faster. Example, when they're trying to find Elsa and are chased by wolves, when Kristoff is racing Anna to the Kingdom so she can kiss Hans, when Kristoff is racing across the frozen water to save Anna from dying. He's a vehicle.

Many people might find Olaf annoying because he's the comic relief but he also serves another purpose. Examples, he led them to Elsa's ice castle and he rescued Anna when she was locked up by Hans. And lastly, he represents the fact that Elsa can create, not just hurt or destroy (for people who were confused about the part where Anna recognizes him; Anna does not regain her memories when she recognized him, she just remembered building him with her sister and that is it. She doesn't remember the magic involved).

The bad guys of the movie were interesting in that they were evil, but in the most humanly way possible: money and power. Hans was driven by power and the man of Weasel town was driven by money. Hans of course was more of a monster because he callously manipulated Anna, lied to her and the people around him, to get what he wanted. He was willing to marry into the family, bid his time, and then get rid of the sisters and become king. That is a serpent hidden in sheep's clothing and possibly one of the darker villains (right below Scar who actually killed his brother and chased his nephew away into the wild where he hoped he would die so he could become king). Old man Weasel took advantage of the situation and tried to turn it to his favor by killing Elsa. He didn't initially come to the kingdom looking to overthrow but to exploit. The fact that he was also duped by Hans makes him less of a villain than Hans (but definitely no less of a bad guy).

**Clarifying some plot points**

I'd like to first clarify that Frozen is a loose adaptation of The Snow Queen. By loose, I mean they were inspired by some of the elements in the fairy tale but for the most part it's an original movie. An example of this would be the elves in Tolkien's works. They were inspired by the elves in Norse mythology (and possibly some other mythologies) but they are their own thing. Completely different but with elements here and there that reference back to the Norse mythology. If you want an exact retelling of the Snow Queen, just watch the old cartoon movie or watch the new one.

The story in itself was fairly well told considering the time constraint. The relationship that Anna and Elsa have is highlighted in the beginning and made especially poignant by the song "Do you want to build a snowman." It is a song that encompasses the degeneration of their former relationship as the years go by to the point that Anna doesn't even try to get her sister to interact with her anymore because she's convinced herself that there's no point. Elsa's song "Let it go," is another song that reveals something about the state of the character. She speaks about feeling liberated implying that all these years she's felt like a prisoner. It also reveals that she prefers to be alone because then she doesn't have to hide herself or her powers and would rather be looked at as a monster or villain as long as it keeps people away. That's where the catchphrase, "The cold never bothered me anyway," comes into play which, if people want to take literally, that's fine. I mean her powers are ice so the cold shouldn't bother her anyway, but it also has a figurative meaning. Cold implies loneliness, despair, and emptiness. So her saying that the cold never bothered her could be interpreted as her saying that being alone doesn't bother her, as neither does the suffering that comes with it, because she would prefer it over lying to herself and putting the ones she loves in danger. Having to suppress her magic must have also been very hard for her because, since she was born with the powers of ice, they are a part of her, which would also explain why she was so excited at finally being able to release them in all their glory. It would be like releasing a part of herself that she'd been suppressing for years.

There have also been complaints at the fact that the story only seems to take place in a matter of twenty-four hours. Let's go by events from the time of the coronation to the end of the movie: Anna wakes up, the coronation takes place, Elsa looses control, Anna goes to find her and enlists the help of Kristoff. That is one day. The next day involves finding Elsa and getting chased by the snow creature and taking her to the trolls. That would be day two. Kristoff then races to bring Anna back to the kingdom and the big showdown goes down. That is three days. Three days is the average amount of time that things happen in Disney movies. Examples: The Little Mermaid, Pocahontas, Aladdin, Tangled, etc. Another thing people might have found annoying or wrong, is the fact that Elsa's kingdom is really only a small town. Now _I_ can imagine that the kingdom stretches far and that there are many small villages (or at least families) scattered all around the forest (as shown by the shop owner who seems to be in the middle of nowhere) and that the town we're shown is what we would consider a capital. But if one can't be persuaded to use imagination, I would like to point out that there have been other, much smaller kingdoms, across Disney movies. The one that comes to mind is the Beast's kingdom in _Beauty and the Beast_. It appears to only be a castle and even to this day, I'm not sure what exactly he rules. Another example is that in _Snow White_, the kingdom wasn't even shown or explored so it might as well not exist (since the viewer can't see it). I will say though that the trolls could have been done better. It's really not explained how the king knew them or where they even came from although it does give a nod to Scandinavian mythology. Since the land seems extremely magical (with Elsa being born with her powers), I can only assume that trolls, while not a common sight, exist and people know about them (or at least believe that they exist).

One last thing, since I'm not an expert in the mechanics behind animation itself, I can't really say anything too in depth about it except that the snow looked lovely (I can only imagine how much time and effort was put forth in making it. It looks like there are individual snowflakes). And the way Elsa's icy powers were used was a wonder to watch. I know most people will say that the two female characters look a lot like Rapunzel but I don't really see it. I do see though, that Elsa and Anna's face designs are identical. If it wasn't for the hair and the different types of freckles they have, they could be twins.

In summation, I consider this movie a very enjoyable one and recommend it to anyone that loves good animation, lovely music, a solid plot, and complex but flawed characters. I know there are many people who wish Disney could learn to take risks but I'd just like to say that Disney caters to families and children. Going by this, I hope you can understand why they won't make their animated movies darker. Parents of today are much more protective of showing their children things they deem too violent or scary. Very different from back in the day. And Disney aims to keep their main consumers happy. Which is fine. They like making money. All big companies do. It's not like it's a secret. There are plenty of other studios that make animated movies for adults, young adults, and children.


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